According to Eustace, I should be eating more spinach. In truth, I think we all should!
Lately I’ve been craving it something fierce. I suppose that I probably look and feel a great deal like Olive Oil did, from that old Saturday morning cartoon!
Out of curiosity over my severe cravings, Eustace and I got to reading some things about natural foods.
Check this out! I clipped this off a nutrition calculator:
Nutrition Facts
Serving Size
1 cup (180g)
Calories
41
% Daily Value *
Total Fat 0.47g
1%
Saturated Fat 0.08g
0%
Trans Fat 0g
Cholesterol 0mg
0%
Sodium 126mg
5%
Total Carbohydrate 6.8g
2%
Dietary Fiber 4.3g
15%
Total Sugars 0.77g
2%
Includes –g Added Sugars
–%
Protein 5.3g
11%
Vitamin C 17.6mg
20%
Vitamin D 0mcg
0%
Iron 6.4mg
36%
Calcium 244.8mg
19%
Potassium 838.8mg
18%
Phosphorus 100.8mg
8%
*The % Daily Value (DV) tells you how much a nutrient in a serving of food contributes to a daily diet. 2,000 calories a day is used for general nutrition advice.
While most may assume the lottery to mean cash money, there are a number of other possibilities…
Such as peanuts! Why can’t there be a lottery for a lifetime supply of peanuts?
Or flowers, perhaps…
What about a lifetime supply of all the most beautiful spring blooms? Wouldn’t that be heavenly? Well, at least the fragrance would seem sent from above, in my humble opinion.
Then there’s babies…
Ok, so maybe that’s going a bit too far… but you can’t blame a girl for trying!
Now, books as a lottery?
SOLD!!!
Since the likelihood of an All-You-Can-Read book lottery isn’t that high for me, at this moment, how about we settle on a Cookie Lottery…
If I could eat anything I wanted, without any penalties, it would definitely be something from the fair!
While I could regale you with all of my favorite snacks, I think that Templeton should take over from here…
I couldn’t have said it better, myself!
Now that I’ve probably gone and made you hungry, I thought it prudent to offer up some worthy fair food substitutes. And what would be worthy, you ask?
Well, I knew that you knew that I would know to offer you cookies…
Eustace is still visiting his family, but wanted to send you his customary Wednesday greeting. He should be home by next week, I think. You know how camel’s can be when they’re with their caravan. I may even have to send Brutus off to collect our big guy, what with all those sparkly bangles he’s wearing… no way for him to sneak all that jewelry past airport security, without setting off all the alarms!
While I could regale you for hours with all the times I’ve performed over the years, would it be worth the mention if my only audiences were fictional ones?
Well, they weren’t all fictional, to be totally fair about things. My performance career began very early on, where I learned to hone my speech and drama skills on any and all of my baby dolls.
From there, I branched out over the years to include any living animal that was either willing to stay and listen or coralled long enough to endure my theatrical onslaught!
Eventually, my poor audience members would run when they saw me preparing for one of my performances, leaving me to talk to myself… which I readily did!
If you were to ask any one of my adult children, I’m sure they would attest to my ability to give such lengthy speeches that they wished they could escape, just as all my childhood audience victims had done!
So, there you have it, my friends!
As the title of this post reflects, as far as performing and/or speech giving… The world really is my oyster.
(Even though I may love our little apartment, I still miss that park, the squirrels, and even that silly old broken down R.V.)
I choose my local park, hands down, as my favorite place!
While I’m sure the local squirrels love anyone who gives them peanuts, I choose to believe that they love mine the best. Due to my absolute love and fascination of these small ones, my husband has now moved to buying Biggie size bags of peanuts… it has become my mission to ensure full tummies and fluffy tails through the cold months.
Most days you will find me walking along the path with a string of boisterous chatterboxes darting between my feet. These little ones show no fear whatsoever… only excited anticipation of the treats they know to be forthcoming.
I’ve become so fond of these fluffy characters, stories began to form in my mind of their miniature world. In a way, a squirrel’s life is much less complicated than a humans… but is it really? In other ways, the life of these tiny creatures is far more harsh than ours is… but is it really? Writing stories for squirrels using human nature as the reality of their social structure is rather easy.
The park is massive, holding 4 large sports fields used in the warmer months, a large Tennis court that keeps busy nearly all year long, and multiple trails running through several playgrounds and down all along the White River. For a smaller community, this park gets a great amount of use, and a great amount of care. The city puts forth a great amount of effort to maintain and care for this place and that makes my heart happy.
Living in a house with wheels means that we may not always be in this particular location, in close proximity to such a beautiful and peaceful place. For me, the beauty and peace are not limited to just one place… no matter where our wheels come to rest, God always gives me a park and/or a trail to walk… always! Here’s the tricky part… I have to be looking.
It’s rather funny that I’ve known about this park for years and never walked it’s paths. I lived in this very same city over 10 years ago… not 5 blocks from where we are at the moment, never once walking beneath it’s trees. I wasn’t looking… but I am now! In a way I suppose that God has used this park, and these creatures to work part of His healing in my wounded spirit. This is a wonderful part of nature that draws me to return time and again… I see my Fathers hand everywhere my eyes look. From the smell of the earth, to the sounds of the world around me… from the antics of the squirrels to the laughter of the children playing… From the warmth of the sunshine to the bitter cold of winter… I see His hand in all of it.
Long story short, the local park is my Jam…
Here, have a cookie…
These were gifted to us by Acorn Valley’s most talented royal Chef, Rollina MutterNut.
… like the frozen peaks of a mighty mountain range. Sadly, little can survive there.
What about finding church in nature?
Can all that quite beauty and solitude become a church, of sorts? Meditating in peace, while trying to safely navigate this lost and fallen world?
Can Church be found in a book, but not in a heart?
What about where 2 or more are gathered?
Do I fit into the Church, or is the Church supposed to reside within Me?
Google says that the Bible mentions the word Church about 120 different times.
Somebody on Google also says that there are estimated to be between eight and 16 million actual church buildings in the world.
Another person says that there are 37 million churches throughout the world.
Oh yeah, and I also read that there are more than 45,000 Christian denominations in the world. I think I found all this information in under 5 minutes on the great World Wide Web. What started out as my morning quiet time in the word, turned into 2 days of trail walks, another day pondering my own church experiences, and then finally, the above mentioned 5 minutes of “Google is your friend”!
Honestly, at this point, I was feeling like a deer caught in someone’s proverbial headlights! I know we all believe that google is our friend, but let me tell ya, not only is it your friend, but EVERYBODY’S friend! Electronic Overshare Overload is what I will consider reality! Jokes aside, the web can be a great resource, within reason. Too much of a good thing can be not so good for us. Well, at least that’s how that old saying goes, anyways.
I am realizing that I am not interested in what the WWW thinks, nor am I certain as to where I stand with my own beliefs, regarding this subject.
However, here is the awesome truth about faith… I do believe in WHO God is and what He says to me! If I am to believe that the Bible is 100% truth, it goes to show that I will find the honest answers to my questions within this very book, right? Within this one book are my answers, written down simply and clearly, assuming I am truly seeking the HONEST answer.
With this truth upon my heart, I am embarking on a journey of knowledge, that I may see with clarity a Godly understanding of Church, His purpose, and how I fit into the body of Christ (His Church).
You know I will not go all the way to some clarity, without returning with some really great stories for you all. Keep a weathered eye out for me, and I will see you on the (metaphorical) flip side…
Hands down, I am far happier feeling the dew of the morning while walking along the shoreline of a beach, than I am about drinking that wretched beverage!
Forgive me if you like this drink, as I meant no offense, but the prompt asked… so it’s their fault, really.
If I’m asked to show my preference between the two… so be it!
To be fully honest, as well as to be fair to the beverage companies, I’ve lost the taste for beverages with sugar in them… aside from the French Vanilla Creamer that goes in my morning coffee. After my caffeine requirements are met for the day, I switch to either Peppermint Tea or good ole fashion H2O. I like sugar, so don’t get me wrong here… I just don’t enjoy it in my beverages.
Well folks, there ya have it! Far too much useless information about me that no one really needed to know, sort of like asking whether I prefer the mountains over the beach. What an absurd question to ask, when both locations have their very own beauties about them, ya know?!
Anyways, have an awesome weekend, everyone. Oh, and don’t forget to grab a goodie on your way out…
Journey With Me! 